Tour the sausage factory

This blog is intended to be a peak over my shoulder as I go about the process of creating my editorial cartoons. I’ll post notes I scribble over coffee in the morning, doodles during meetings and some rough pencil sketches that develop throughout the day – that is, the raw materials that go into the finished drawings you see on the editorial page. This blog is most likely to be refreshed on Mondays, Wednesdays and Fridays.

Touring this sausage factory is not for the faint-hearted. I won’t be making any effort to translate or interpret for you the sometimes-cryptic hieroglyphics in my sketchbook. A cartoonist frequently spends a whole day following the call of a distant muse only to pull an unrelated idea out of a back pocket. My initial sketches are seldom decipherable to anyone but me, jotted down solely so they won’t slip away as I pursue others. Then again, almost every drawing I publish in the Enquirer has its origin in these sketchbook pages. Some are flash fried for the next day’s paper; others are marinated for months.

You’re invited to respond to these musings if you like, either verbally or with your own drawings. Though I seldom use other people’s ideas, suggestions are politely entertained and enjoyed, sometimes twisted into new shapes or mangled beyond recognition. The muses don’t let me up for air very much, so no responses are promised.

If this leaves you with an appetite for more sausage, check out borgman.enquirer.com where you’ll find all sorts of other cool stuff.